In May this year, Twitter launched the first-ever Bollywood character emoji — for Salman Khan’s Tubelight . Any tweet with hashtags such as #Tubelight, #TubelightKiEid and #RadioWalaGaana had a specially-designed emoji appearing next to it.

From October 26, 2007, when it debuted on the microblogging site with the Ranbir Kapoor-Sonam Kapoor starrer Saawariya , Bollywood has come a long way. The movie, which launched the duo, was arguably Bollywood’s first to use a Twitter handle for promotions.

The first tweet from @Saawariya was posted on October 26, 2007, and 11 more followed it on the same day.

Twitter was just a year-and-a-half-old then, and Bollywood baby steps drew much praise. “Awesome! I guess a first in film PR,” tweeted Abhishek Baxi (@baxiabhishek). Priya Shah (@shahpriya) replied: “Yup i was in shock when i saw it too ,,,,, But its great too see sum1 understanding and using it.”

According to their Twitter bios, Baxi is a digital consultant while Shah is a “Bollywood loving, tea junkie, and an eternal entrepreneur”.

In a 2008 blog post, Twitter co-founder Biz Stone said: “We know there’s lots of folks in India who like Twitter. We’ve already noticed some cricket action and at least one Bollywood movie.” He had also posted a link to the Saawariya tweets.

Multiple facets

Viral Jani, Head of Entertainment and TV Partnerships of Twitter India, said only on the site could one witness every facet of Bollywood and also join in the conversation.

“As conversations on Bollywood continue to grow on Twitter... the industry at large started discovering and leveraging the platform as an opportunity to market their movies and strengthen the connection with their fans,” he said. Giving the example of Shah Rukh Khan’s 2014 flick Happy New Year , he Jani said it began the trend of allowing users to track the movie’s shooting schedule from the tweets of the stars involved.

Last month, Judwaa2 extended the online engagement with meet-and-greet sessions in several cities. Actor Varun Dhawan engaged fans with personal reminders on Twitter before the film’s release, and a special emoji, recalled Jani.

Platforms like Twitter help connect with young movie-goers easily, said Rishabh Shetty, director of the recent Kannada hit Kirik Party , adding that the one-to-one communication provides a learning process for the filmmaker also.

“If filmmakers have good content, it is easier for them to sell it on platforms like Twitter.,” said Raj B Shetty, who directed and starred in the Kannada hit Ondu Motteya Kathe .

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